Category Archives: Writing Fiction

Many years ago (back in 1986) I read ‘Creativity The Magic Synthesis’ by Silvano Arieti. This work had a profound effect on my confidence in my pursuit of the arts.

Arieti argued that Creativity is a gift but that it cannot be manifested without hard work. I begged to differ on the idea that we live in a society of ‘gifted’ individuals. I wholeheartedly believe that we are ALL GIFTED to be what we DESIRE TO be. I also don’t mean being mediocre in attainment of our pursuits but rather being truly excellent in our craft. However, and here’s the ‘but’, Arieti’s ‘formula’, requiring the artist to put in considerable effort.

I approach the writing art more from the Anthony Robbins perspective – where you can truly achieve anything you want provided you:

Know what it is what you want.

Take action, take MASSIVE action towards attainment of your goal

Notice if the action you are taking is working or not

If it isn’t – change your approach

….but I digress!

Back to the title of this article “Free Flowing”.

Those familiar with Silvano Arieti’s work will know that he studied schizophrenic patients. He would make observations where his patients would describe something and that thought would ‘morph’ into a related concept.

For example: Patient A would start talking about her cat. The conversation would go something like this:

I love my cat George. He’s only two years old but I feel like he’s been my friend all my life. I named him George because of George Washington. There really isn’t any reason why I picked Washington. I guess its because I did a paper on Washington back in the seventh grade. I was twelve years old in the seventh grade. We lived in the Bronx and dad drove a bus. He loved his job but I don’t think mom was crazy about him being a bus driver. He had an accident and was in the hospital for a week. Luckily no one died.

Arieti noticed that Schizophrenic patients would often flow from one idea to another. Something would link the two thoughts. In non-schizophrenic discussions people normally know to keep the idea flowing from the topic sentence. They may (and often do) shift to a related thought but then will circle back and keep on the main topic.

How can this help you as a writer?

The concept of ‘Free Flowing’ is on some very subconscious level an element of creativity. When momentarily inhibiting your conscious reasoning your subconscious takes over and something truly amazing happens. You begin to pull up associations that are truly creative.

This method of writing may not appeal or even work for everyone but it always does accomplish bringing out elements that one would not normally not accomplish when writing in the natural and reasoning mindset.

Will it work for you?

You can try this exercise:

Begin with the intent to sit down and write for a predetermined amount of time.

Begin with a topic sentence and then write freely.

Don’t stop!

Don’t try to think too hard!

Allow yourself to write pure garbage.

Allow the thoughts to flow and even drift from one topic to another.

Repeat steps 3 to 6 above.

If you did this correctly you will have created something pretty interesting. a lot of it may be totally unusable – and that is absolutely normal. However, you may have achieved some or potentially all of the following:

You may have one or more ideas for stories

You may have wonderful lines of writing that are not only usable but absolutely genius!

You may have developed or fleshed out background for an existing story or for a character.

I hope you enjoyed this. Please let me know in the comments section if this actually helped.

Story A: “Found Footage” film about a group of teens visiting the abandoned insane asylum.

Story B: “Found Footage” film about a group of teens breaking into a highly restricted military hanger.

Despite the overdone found footage genre I bet a number of you would still prefer Story B. The insane asylum, or abandoned prison, etc., has been overdone to death.

Definition:

Cliché – when a writing tool is used over again to a degree that it loses it’s sense of appeal.

What made the original terminator so great? For one thing it was creating an ending that seemed at the time to defy a typical ending. When the truck crashed into the terminator and exploded into flames – everyone thought that was it. Ending it then would have been okay but the story defied the typical cliché and progressed into a new climax – now the terminator was walking and Kyle Reese and Sarah Conner were on the run again!

How come hitting someone on the head always renders the person unconscious? Wouldn’t it be refreshing for once if you hit someone on the head and instead of falling outright or (the other cliché) not having any effect – stumble in pain? Or why is it that women are always victims and men are always perpetrators? Or at least they are depicted that way over and over again.

Clichés can ruin a good story – to do away with them is ask: “what’s too normal about this?” If it is – get rid of it!